Today is a day to celebrate friends. It’s also Facebook’s birthday, but today isn’t about celebrating us. It’s about friendship.

This sounds simple, but not often enough are we taught to celebrate friends. Growing up, we learn that homework and chores are more important and need to be done before we can spend time with friends. As adults, we’re told we’re responsible when we put our work ahead of our family and friends.

Friendship isn’t a distraction from the meaningful things in life. Friendship is what gives meaning to our lives.

Our friendships make the world work. We laugh, we cry and we learn with friends. We eat, we shop and we work with friends. And when we fight for what we believe and change the world, we do that with friends too.

As we all do our part in this journey to connect the world, it’s important to remind ourselves to celebrate what’s at the root of it all: friendship.

Thank you for being part of our community of friends. Let’s turn today into a day to celebrate a friend. #friendsday

Posted on 06 August 2013

We should go get drinks sometime soon. We should totally go on a trip to Atlantic City! You know what we should do? We should get everyone together for a parrrtyyyy! Yeah!

It’s easy to make plans, but keeping them is a different story. A new app launching out of New York aims to change all that. However, the aptly named WeShould app doesn’t work like any of the social planning apps that have come before it. Rather than making connections, setting dates, and choosing activities on a network, WeShould is one-sided, with no real networking function at all.

Instead, WeShould users are asked to choose ten friends they plan on hanging out with soon. These can be imported from Facebook or input manually. Then, you can add more detail to each friendship, including how often you hang out with this or that person, what activities you enjoy together, etc.

From there, you have a dashboard outlining each of your major friendships, letting you make a plan, jot down a gift idea, or set a reminder. If you make a plan, you have four easy options of movies, food, deals, and tickets. WeShould partners with Fandango, Yelp, LivingSocial and SeatGeek to offer an app-within-an-app experience, so you can buy tickets and book trips right then and there.

But if none of those options tickle your fancy, WeShould offers up curated experiences based on your friendship feedback, in challenge form. They sound something like: “Pick a bar trivia night and go for a top three finish,” or “go for a one-hour walk and discover some new things.”

By using the app-within-an-app model, WeShould pays nothing to the services sending in data but rather receives a small percentage of each sale made within the WeShould app. Meanwhile, the company plans on transitioning the challenge section of the app into a sponsored challenge revenue stream.

But beyond business models and cash flow, WeShould does something interesting to the idea of social planning. There are already more than enough tools out there to facilitate setting a plan, or making a date. Instead of trying to funnel that communication through a brand new platform, WeShould is more of a personal planner and assistant, dedicated to making us better friends.

Sure, it could use some navigational tweaks, but the core of the idea is a smart one. If you’re interested in more, check out WeShould on the Apple App Store.

Posted on 30 July 2013

Facebook is constantly adjusting its post-sorting News Feed algorithm, occasionally polling users about the content they see. Earlier, Inside Facebook learned about a prompt that Facebook had in News Feed when a user hid a post. Now, an Inside Facebook reader reported seeing the above prompt in the sidebar about one of their friends.

Facebook’s goal for News Feed is to deliver the most relevant content, meaning users will see posts more often from their closest friends and pages with which they engage. By polling users about the strength of their friendship, Facebook can learn more about the ties between users.

For instance, if the user checked that Emanuel is one of his best friends, it’s likely that more posts from Emanuel would start showing in News Feed. Conversely, if the user checked that he doesn’t know Emanuel, or he’s merely an acquaintance, fewer posts would likely show in News Feed.

Posted on 06 February 2013

Facebook has introduced mobile versions of its “friendship pages” that show two users’ history on the social network.

For now these are primarily able the be accessed from m.facebook.com, but a spokesperson tells us they will be added to the native iOS and Android apps in the coming months.

Friendship pages display users’ mutual friends, Likes, photos and interactions on Facebook. They were redesigned to match the Timeline format in November 2012, but hadn’t been available via mobile until now. The mobile version lets users scroll quickly through their history with a person and view the things they have in common with the user, but unlike on desktop, users cannot customize the cover photo or life events on the page.
Users of the mobile touch site will find a link to “See Friendship” in the following places:

News Feed stories about wall posts

News Feed stories about Gifts

Wall posts

Life events

Right-hand drop down menu on friends’ Timelines

Users of the native app might see the friendship link on stories about Facebook Gifts, but the pages are not otherwise accessible in the apps yet.

Users can view friendship pages between two other users, but they will only see the posts and information that they are otherwise able to see under the content’s existing privacy settings.

Posted on 08 November 2012

Facebook today unveiled a redesign of “friendship pages” that show two users’ history on the social network in Timeline format.

Friendship pages display users’ mutual friends, Likes, photos and interactions on Facebook. With the new Timeline layout, these pages are now easier to navigate and match the latest design of other pages and profiles. The update also gives users more options to customize the pages and a more complete look at shared activity between two friends.

Friendship pages now feature a cover photo. By default, Facebook will select an image in which both users are tagged and that has received some Likes and comments from friends. Whereas previously users could not change their default image, either friend can now add a new photo to the top. There’s a new option at the bottom of the page to fill in details about when, where and how two friends met. Users can also click the star icon on certain stories to highlight them, as they would on their own profile. There is another option to hide stories from a friendship page. These features help make the pages feel more personal than the previous version users couldn’t control in any way.

Another upgrade is that friendship pages now feature all stories between friends, including life events, check-ins and Open Graph app activity. Previously, the pages showed wall posts and @ mentions, but not stories about users being at the same place or taking an Open Graph action together.

It’s important to note that although anyone can see two other users’ friendship pages, the privacy setting of posts and activity persist, so no one will be able to see anything they wouldn’t otherwise be able to see on an individual profile. Users should keep in mind that hiding a story from their own Timeline without deleting it means it is still eligible to appear on a friendship page since it may still be visible on the friend’s Timeline.

Friendship pages first debuted in October 2010, after beginning as a Hackathon project. Users can navigate to friendship pages by visiting a friend’s profile and clicking the gears icon and then “See friendship.” From News Feed, users can hover over a friend’s name and click “See friendship” from the hovercard that appears. Once a user is on a friendship page, they can click the “More” button and type in the name of any two friends.

Users who are in a relationship can quickly see their friendship page here.

Posted on 08 November 2012

Facebook has a little-known feature called Friendship Pages that shows all the wall posts, updates, and photos you’re tagged in with someone. Today it’s getting a redesign, and Facebook is launching the facebook.com/us quick link for couples to see their Friendship Pages. The previous design was stuck on on the ugly, old profile format, but now they look like a shared Timeline.

You can check out your FriendShip Page with someone by going to their profile, clicking the gear icon on the right, and selecting “See Friendship”. There you can browse your mutual friends and Likes, the photos you’re tagged in together, and see a Timeline of all the posts you’re in together. Facebook even chooses a mutually tagged photo for your cover image.

Friendship Pages aren’t totally complete. You won’t see each other’s posts that you’ve Liked or commented on, but they still give you an emotional look at your history with someone. Or between two other people. If you click the “More” button on the right of any Friendship Page, Facebook will suggest other friendships to view or let you punch in any two of your friends’ names to see theirs.

For couples it’s even easier. Just go to http://www.facebook.com/us and if you’re in a Facebook relationship with someone, you’ll see your Friendship Page. If you’re all alone, you’ll sadly get dropped back on your own profile. The redesign and couples pages are rolling out gradually starting today, so you might still see the old design for a while.

Friendship Pages serve to remind you that your whole life is on Facebook, and if you leave, you lose. Facebook originally launched the feature two years ago but it hasn’t gotten much love since. That’s a shame and today’s update is nice because they’re a cute way to relieve memories with those you care about most.

Then again, you could always check out your “Friendship” Page with someone you’re technically friends with but actually kind of hate. “Why did you have to ruin that party?” “This photo would have been so much better if you weren’t in it”. And if you really want some agony, check out your Friendship Page with one of your exes. If only you hadn’t been so focused on your group buying photo cloud startup, she’d still be yours.

He admitted the feeling is mutual. Marketers complain that Facebook doesn’t understand their needs, while Facebook complains that marketers don’t understand what works. Luckily, Adams wasn’t just complaining. He had specific thoughts on what marketers are getting wrong, and how they can do better. For one thing, he said that marketers who think Facebook needs to expand its offering to include things like larger units and pre-roll ads are “misunderstanding how our platform works.”

All these attempts to create ads that interrupt users or grab their attention are misguided, because Facebook isn’t about moving peoples attention from one spot to another, and it’s not about trying to make something happen now, he said.

Instead, Facebook is all about building relationships. That means marketers should focus on “many lightweight interactions over time.” Using tools like Facebook Pages, Sponsored Stories, and Open Graph apps, brands can slowly build relationships with consumers, in the same way that getting little updates from your friends (that they listened to a song on Spotify or went for a three-mile run with RunKeeper or whatever) can build your friendship over time: “Sometimes, serendipitously, those [individual] stories are interesting, but it’s the aggregations that are really powerful.”

Adams said that trying to serve an intrusive ad instead of building a relationship with a customer is like “trying to throw a party with a bunch of strangers. It’s not going to be a very good party.” However, once advertisers have been interacting with fans for a while, then they can try to do something more meaningful: “Suddenly you’re throwing it with people you’ve built a relationship with.”

This is a problem we’ve seen before. Every time a new communication technology is invented, people try to apply the methods of existing media to the new medium. In this case, Adams said advertisers are trying use the TV advertising approach. That doesn’t make sense on Facebook, and as “the Web is being rebuilt around people,” it’s going to make less and less sense online.

Adams previously led the social user experience research team at Google, and he has a book out about social networks. So if his approach sounds a little intellectual compared to most advertisers and technologists, that’s probably why.

Posted on 29 December 2011

When Michael Selvidge called me up to talk about his new project, Callin’ Oates, I laughed it off and called it “silly”. Built with the help of a friend to satisfy the new-hire requirements at Michael’s new job (at Twilio, where every employee has to build an app with their cloud-based telephony API) it’s an on-demand Hall & Oates hotline. Call the number, pick a song, hear Hall & Oates music. Simple.

One week, 600,000 phone calls, and a mountain of coverage later, it’s probably safe to say this little weekend project was a success. I still think it’s silly.

To celebrate their success, Reid Butler (the aforementioned friend) has released the service’s code and a quick tutorial on how to put it all together to build a hotline of your very own. Think of the possibilities! Bob Dialin’! Rung D.M.C! The Rolling Tones!

Alas, gag clones aren’t Butler’s intention in releasing the code. Instead, the guys hope that bands will take the concept and make their own hotlines as a new form of promotion. Sure, that kind of ignores that a good chunk of Callin’ Oates success presumably stems from the hokeyness of the whole thing — but hey, free knowledge!

Butler is releasing the code via his newly formed “Exploring Twilio” blog, where he plans to dive deeper into developing with Twilio’s APIs over time. And for the curious: Butler is neither employed nor affiliated with Twilio, outside of his friendship with Michael.

Bonus Video:

At the peak of the Callin’ Oates excitement, I found out Selvidge and Butler were going on the local ABC affiliate for an interview. Dared them to sneak a “meow” in there somewhere… and they did. Catch it a minute and thirty seconds in:

Posted on 28 October 2010

Facebook today announced a new product called Friendship Pages which show users all the content and connections shared by two people who are friends, including photos they’re both tagged in, wall posts and comments between them, Events they both RSVP’d to, and their mutual friends and Likes. While not fully rolled out yet, users will be able to visit Friendship Pages by clicking links on wall posts, relationship feed stories, and under profile pictures, as long as they are friends with one of the people and have permission to view the other’s profile. By aggregating mutual content, Friendship Pages give users a in-depth look at relationships.

Upon visiting a Friendship Page, users will see the two people’s names, and their networks, such as employer or college. The left sidebar includes a photo both people are tagged in as a profile picture, navigation links to different content categories including mutual likes, and a list of all of their mutual friends. The center of the Friendship Page contains the wall posts between the people, the Events they both attended, and posts in which both users commented. Above the ads and modules in the right sidebar is a new “Browse Friendships” module which prompts users to enter their name or a friends name in one input field, another friend’s name in the second input field, and click a button to “See Friendship”. It’s currently unclear where mutual photos will be shown.

Friendship Pages will take a lot of the work out of Facebook browsing. Currently, if you wanted to determine the connection between two other people, you would have to sift through all their tagged photos looking for ones with both people, view their wall-to-wall page, and manually compare their friends and Likes. There was no feasible way to see their shared Event RSVPs or comments.

The friends of friends privacy setting now has greater significance, as a user only needs to be friends with one person and have access to the profile of the other to see their Friendship Page. While fun and useful for learning about how you and a friend or two of your friends are connected, the product could also be used to investigate the connection between one of your friends and someone you don’t know. It could become a powerful tool for jealous users to monitor their significant others, or a masochistic way to watch how a former significant other is interacting with their new partner. Similar relationship issues led Facebook to change how the Photo Memories module chose who to display.

Facebook’s high engagement and user retention statistics are tied to the human desire to forge and maintain connections with others. To date, though, Facebook has been better at showing users snippets of their connections with many different people. By allowing users to focus on a single connection, Facebook will help many realize just how integral the service has been to the formation of deep and long-lasting friendships.

Posted on 30 August 2010

After having launched integrations with Twitter and other sites, MySpace has launched a new form of Facebook integration today. Now, it’s easy for MySpace users to syndicate their status updates on Facebook as well. The UI is available to users in a drop-down on MySpace’s status publisher, beneath the Twitter syndication feature that MySpace introduced last year.

As part of this, MySpace is also asking users for extended permissions for publishing to their walls — but is is also asking for access to their Photos and Videos on Facebook, and their Facebook data when they’re not using the application. In other words, MySpace is asking for permission to access lots of valuable social data from Facebook, but we don’t yet know how it might use that data in its products.

We should note that Facebook and MySpace have been talking about some sort of deal since last fall, as we and others were hearing. Then-chief executive Owen Van Natta told The Telegraph that MySpace saw value in Facebook for its content plans. “We are in talks with Facebook, and other sites, about how we could partner with them. Partnerships are going to be a big part of our strategy moving forward as a lot of value can be derived from them. Facebook is about core communications with your friendship network, whereas MySpace is about congregating around popular content with people who share your interests.”

The MySpace blog post on the matters has that same theme today: “Sync with Facebook allows users to keep their friends on Facebook up to date on everything, including: sharing songs, latest photos, fun game apps, and more.” Perhaps MySpace will attract some avid Facebook social gamers through news feed updates?

The integration could bring new usage scenarios to MySpace, but also reinforces the need for MySpace to provide a differentiated social service in order to lure users away. Van Natta is now at Zynga, the leading social gaming developer on Facebook and MySpace’s platforms; Mike Jones is now CEO at MySpace, apparently pushing the current integration forward – and MySpace still has considerable traffic.